Chapter 9 #3
He reached for her reins and stopped her horse. “Lady Madeleine, none of us has more luxury of refusal than you. You can turn your back on us all and return to your nunnery. If we refuse to accept your decision, we will be flung into the outer darkness where the king’s favor will never shine.”
He was deadly serious. “But he favors you.”
“That has little to do with it.”
The riders behind split and rode around them. No one, apparently, was going to object to this tête-à-tête. Nor was Madeleine. He seemed to be in a mood for plain speaking, and perhaps at last she could make sense of everything.
“Why don’t you want to marry me?” she asked, studying his face again for Edwald. It was hard to be sure. If he was Edwald, surely he’d jump at the chance of controlling a barony and using all its resources for the rebellion.
“I don’t want to marry a woman I don’t like.”
She gasped. “Why am I so repulsive to you? In all honor, I am no more a sinner than the next person. Without vanity I have to say I am not hard to look at. Why?”
His eyes were hard. Nothing like Edwald’s. “I speak English,” he said, “and I know Baddersley. You are a harsh and ruthless woman. Doubtless those are excellent qualities in some circumstances, but they are not ones I seek in a wife.”
“Harsh?” she queried blankly. “Ruthless?”
He slipped off his horse and stood with his hand on her pommel. “Does that description offend you?” he asked. “I would have thought you’d glory in such terms.”
She looked down at him, and then at his hand on her saddle.
Madeleine’s mind was fogged by the awareness of his hand so close to the join of her thighs where they were stretched across the horse, by the warm weight of his arm across her thigh.
She looked around dazedly. The two of them were alone. “The hunt . . .”
“Ride on then.”
Eyes fixed unseeingly on that hand, Madeleine made no move to start the horse. He hated her, and yet her body responded to him as to no other. Except Edwald.
“Speak to me in English,” she said.
He was surprised, but after a moment he quoted from a poem.
“ ‘Time and again at the day’s dawning/I must mourn all my afflictions alone./There is no one still living to whom I dare open/The doors of my heart.” ’ The clear, musical English flowed from his tongue with a crisp beauty she had never heard before. Nothing like Edwald’s rough voice.
She sighed. “What do you want?”
“Your word that you will not choose me as husband.”
It should be easy to comply, for had she not decided she’d be mad to marry him?
But that was before she’d found out about Stephen.
“I don’t know,” she said. “I can’t marry Odo.
I can’t tell you why, but I really don’t think I can.
And I don’t want to marry Stephen . . .” She looked sideways at him.
“Odo says he’s been dallying with the castle women. ”
He smiled derisively. “And that turns you against him? Odo and I aren’t virgins, you know.”
“I suppose you’ve dallied with the Baddersley women, too,” she said bleakly, thinking of Aldreda. He was right to laugh at her naivete.
“Of course I have.” A flicker of pleasant recollection passed over his face. “It was a highly memorable encounter.”
Madeleine’s teeth gritted, but she knew him far better than was reasonable, and with a flash of inspiration asked, “On this visit?”
His eyes widened. He grasped her arm and pulled her off the horse.
“What . . . ! Let go of me!”
He had her in a hard grip, one hand at the back of her neck as if he’d break it.
Her heart was thundering, yet not just from terror.
She remembered Odo’s attack and her immediate rejection and disgust. Now she was afraid but also drawn toward something, like a moth toward a deadly flame.
“What are you going to do?” she whispered.
“Kiss you.”
Her lips tingled, and she licked them, unaknowledged hopes beginning to spiral up to her brain. “I thought you didn’t want to marry me.”
“You’re not going to like it,” he promised. “Either crude Odo or philandering Stephen is going to seem a treasure in comparison.”
Hope shattered into acid fragments. She pulled back, but his grip tightened. It bit on an old bruise, and she cried out.
He relaxed his hold instantly and she saw his shock at having hurt her. He might threaten, but she doubted he could really brutalize her, so why was he trying to? “Why?” she asked again. “Why?”
He tightened his lips, changed his grip to a manacle on her wrist, and dragged her away from the restive horses to a mighty oak.
He flung her against it and leaned forward, his hard body confining her.
“I don’t like you, Madeleine de la Haute Vironge.
I don’t want Baddersley. If you force me to marry you, I will make your life a misery. ”
The rough bark of the tree bit into her flesh and revived some bruises, but discomfort was drowned by the smell of leather and sweat, by the hard warmth of his body overlayed by ridges of metal and jewels.
His cruel words clashed with messages her soul drank in.
“I don’t want to marry you either, you know!
” Even as she cried it, she knew it was an utter lie.
And he knew it, too. “Let’s make sure of it,” he said.
One hand snared both her wrists with ease.
The other grabbed her jaw and forced it open as he clamped his lips bruisingly to hers.
His tongue, thick and heavy, thrust deep into her mouth, a vile invasion.
Madeleine gagged. She struggled but could scarcely move.
Her protests produced only mewling, choking sounds.
Blackness started to gather . . .
Then, with a groan, he freed her mouth and pulled her away from the tree into his arms. His hold became not a prison but a haven.
When his lips returned to softly brush hers, Madeleine didn’t shrink away.
When his tongue tentatively brushed against her teeth, her own tongue flicked of its own volition to greet it.
It had learned its lessons well. She looked at him, bewildered.
His eyes, too, were dark, confused, and troubled.
His hand played on her back as if on his lyre, soothing hurts and bringing music to her senses, promising dizzy delights. When his toying fingers found a breast, she whimpered, but it was not a protest. This magic, too, was familiar, and her body leaped to it and could not be deceived.
This was Edwald. This was Golden Hart. She smiled.
Abruptly, he drew back, as dazed as she but horrified. “You’re my death and damnation, witch.”
It cut like a blade. “I mean you no harm,” she protested.
His hand came up to her throat again, but gently. His thumb rubbed against her jaw. “Then don’t marry me, Madeleine.”
She wanted to cry, Why not? But now she knew why.
The Baddersley people knew him as Golden Hart, and one of them was a traitor who might recognize him and betray him to the king.
No, she reminded herself, Golden Hart was the traitor.
The informer was true to King William. She couldn’t want to marry a traitor. She couldn’t.
He read her face. His thumb stopped its tender movement, and his face set hard. “I admit you have a wanton power over me, demoiselle, but I still despise you. Don’t think you can marry me and rule me with lust.”
Madeleine pushed free of him and turned away to fight her tears. “I have no intention of choosing you. I’m going to marry Stephen.”
He spun her back, studied her searchingly, then nodded. “Good,” he said grimly.
They just stood there.
She looked at him and saw a faery prince, a tender outlaw, a cruel traitor.
He looked at her and saw a dusky maiden, a wanton wench, a cruel bitch.
They frowned at each other as their bodies swayed irresistibly closer . . .
Someone cleared a throat.
They broke apart and looked around to see Count Guy surveying them. “You have made your choice, demoiselle?” he asked dryly.
Aimery and Madeleine looked at each other. Their eyes held for a moment before he turned on his heel and stalked over to his horse. “She’s made me very happy,” he said. “She’s going to marry Stephen.”
With that he rode away and took all Madeleine’s hopes of happiness with him.
Count Guy dismounted and came over to her. “You had best mount and ride, Lady Madeleine. Your absence with Aimery has been well marked. There’s no need to cause more talk.”
He helped her into the saddle, and they moved off. Count Guy said, “Did he hurt you?” and she could sense the anger in him. It would be easy to get revenge by saying yes and letting this man punish his son, which he surely would.
Revenge for what?
“I can’t answer that,” she said accurately.
“Demoiselle,” said the count sharply, “it is clear there is more to this situation than I know, but it is your life you are deciding here, yours and that of my son. I ask you to take care.”
“I know it!” she exclaimed. “But what am I to do?” She turned to him in appeal. “Will the king give me more time? More choices?”
Count Guy shook his head. “He has many other matters on his mind, Lady Madeleine. This one must be settled.”
They rejoined the rest of the hunt, which had halted for refreshment. Aimery was with his brother. As Madeleine swung off her horse, she was the focus of curious glances, but nothing was said. Both Odo and Stephen looked sour, but when she made no attempt to join their rival they relaxed.
Stephen soon sauntered over to her side, stroking the hawk on his wrist. With grim determination she smiled at him. As Aimery had said, what did a little philandering matter? It would mean he’d be less often in her bed.
“This is fine country,” he commented, and couldn’t totally hide the greed in the remark.
“Yes,” she admitted, “it is beautiful.”
“And fortunately not in a royal forest. The lord here may actually hunt his own deer.” He might as well have said, “I will be able to hunt my own deer.” Madeleine told herself he was her only choice and worked on her smile.
“That is very fortunate,” she said. “Mismanaged as the manor has been, I fear we will need to hunt to survive this winter. Perhaps we can sell extra venison to buy corn and other necessities.”
She saw him note the “we” and preen. “Surely the place must produce enough to feed the people,” he said idly, as his eyes took possession of her. “They seem few enough.”
“But we need more,” she responded, then realized she’d taken a step backward under the pressure of that covetous look. This would never do. She planted her feet firmly in place. “They will have to be fed over the winter.”
He shrugged that off. “They’ll keep themselves. They always manage somehow or other, like wild beasts.” He stepped closer, and she made herself stay still. He put a hand on her arm and looked into her eyes. “Don’t worry, my angel, I’ll—”
A heron flapped up from the nearby river. With a cry of excitement he turned and loosed his peregrine. Now all his attention was on his bird’s flight. It was as well, Madeleine thought wryly, she did not seek his devotion.
She was rather touched by that charming endearment, “my angel,” but knew she was relieved that the intimate moment had been cut short.
She could not wipe away the thought that if .
. . when she married him tomorrow it would be carried through to its natural conclusion.
His tongue would invade her mouth, his hand touch her breast, and she could not imagine that it would bring the magic she had experienced in other arms.
Her eyes hungrily sought Aimery de Gaillard and easily stripped him naked to her faery prince . . .
She reminded herself sternly that there was more to marriage than two bodies in a bed. Stephen would be a good husband . . . Then she remembered his casual attitude toward the welfare of the people. At least, she thought desperately, he was loyal to the king.
His bird overshot, and the heron was snared by another hawk. When the bird returned to his wrist he said, “Dogsmeat,” in a peevish tone and shoved its hood on roughly.
Madeleine gritted her teeth. She must stop focusing on his lesser qualities. No man was perfect. She had at least learned that lesson.
She would go to the king now, announce her decision, and have it done.